


auspex

by ballantine



Series: noble consuls of rome [9]
Category: Ancient History RPF, Rome (TV 2005), Βίοι Παράλληλοι - Πλούταρχος | Parallel Lives - Plutarch
Genre: Friends & Family, Legislative Violence, M/M, Reunions, Roman Senate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:15:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25787191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ballantine/pseuds/ballantine
Summary: The trouble with a public feud that was actually a private feud was that no one could make informed decisions.
Relationships: Mark Antony/Marcus Junius Brutus the Younger
Series: noble consuls of rome [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1730350
Comments: 7
Kudos: 23





	auspex

The trouble with a public feud that was actually a private feud was that no one could make an informed decision.

Neutral third parties knew one consul to be an honorable man and the other to be a ruthless scoundrel; Rome being what it was, many found it hard to choose between these two options. Meanwhile, active partisans traded in resources and opinions, and were tireless in tearing one man down at the expense of the other. Across the city, calculations and machinations ensued under the erroneous assumption of a broken partnership.

Brutus was determined to put himself above all petty maneuvering. Neither Antony's bullheaded baiting nor Cassius's well intentioned murmurs would push him from his course. But like any man whose chief drive was virtue, he failed to consider the lengths others would go to gain power.

Antony viewed the status quo as his chief enemy. They could only move forward if he destroyed it beyond recognition or repair. But like any man whose chief drive was his past, he failed to accurately judge the present.  
  


* * *

  
The two consuls stood in the Forum, which was as close to neutral ground as they were going to get. The Senate was set to debate corruption issues that day and such was the expectation of acrimony, the meeting was scheduled to begin at dawn. Brutus wanted to start it off on a positive note, and suggested they stand to the side and greet the senators as they proceeded into the Curia. Antony was too tired to argue.

“Did you sleep last night?” asked Brutus. “You look as my mother says I do, after one of my long nights.”

 _As poorly as that?_ he thought. Aloud, he said, “Barely had I shut my eyes than I had to open them again to make the journey into the city.” He gazed stonily at his co-consul, lest he thought to remark how Antony might shorten the trip. Brutus merely raised his eyebrows; he did not need to say it.

“Cassius,” said Antony as the man passed them. “Still here? How is Cyrene coping with its governor so long absent?”

“Some appointments are more short-lived than others,” said Cassius. He smiled at Antony, nodded at Brutus, and continued along.

He considered this response. “I can't tell if that was a threat or yet another complaint about Syria.”

“It's Cassius,” said Brutus. “Likely, it was both.”

“...You know, I am consul,” said Antony a few minutes later, returning to the subject at hand. “So there isn't much to stop me from moving the Senate.”

Brutus, who had began to smile with surprised pleasure at the first half of the statement, looked taken aback by the end of it. “Move the Senate? Why? Where?”

He waved in the direction he had come from. “Closer to my army.”

Brutus glanced around, as if to check the slow but steady procession of senators could not overhear the conversation. “You cannot move the Senate to shorten your commute.”

“There's precedence – Cicero himself did it during his year.”

He looked at him askance. “That was for security purposes.”

“Load of cack. It was because the temple was closer to his house, and the man hates walking.”

Brutus's mouth twitched but he turned away before Antony could see if it turned into something more. “In any case, we can't move the Senate. There isn't an appropriate consecrated site in that part of the city.”

“Right.” Antony resolved to think about that.

They stood in silence for a few more minutes, until the sun rose enough to peek between the edges of basilica arches and hit Antony's eyes directly, at which point he said:

“Why are we standing out here again?” He turned to blink away the sunspots now dotting his vision. “I could've gotten some extra kip on the benches inside before the debate began.”

“Leaving aside how that is not behavior befitting a consul of Rome,” said Brutus at his most intolerably haughty, “we are putting on a friendly, unified front to counteract the rumors of division.”

“Right.” Antony resolved not to think about that.

“Smile, Antony,” he commanded. “I want them to know nothing has changed between us.”

“I think you forget how most senators react when I smile,” he said, but nonetheless he obeyed and did not even say _I told you so_ when the stragglers in the procession started to pick up their pace to pass by more quickly.  
  


* * *

  
Antony had dreamed of crossing the storm-tossed Ionian sea.

In waking life, the journey had been chaotic. He remembered the panic of the men on the rowing benches, the way the waves rose up like walls around them. He saw his pursuers wreck upon the rock-bound shore but knew this end was not for him; a helpful god sent a wind to the south-west, and his galley emerged from the maelstrom into a clean course. They had been spared.

In his dream, Antony stood alone on the galley; the oars were unmanned. And when he rushed to grab one, a thunderbolt struck his hand.  
  


* * *

  
The debate, somehow, was still going on.

“...were reprimanded, they paid a fee,” Cassius said. “In such a case, if the men's work was otherwise exemplary, I see no reason why they should be dismissed and the entire outfit reorganized. Is this not, in a way, punishing the collective for the crimes of the few?”

“If the collective allows such injustice to exist among its ranks, then – yes, yes, I believe they should be punished,” said Brutus.

He was in a rare, fine form, standing boldly before the Senate, his face turned up to address the gathered men with the full force of his unleashed pedantry. Even his body appeared transformed: his height became commanding, all his normally awkward angles somehow shifted to look instead like a clever design. He paced with great energy, and stared into the eyes of every man who spoke.

“Are they still on the embezzlement case?” Hirtius asked Pansa in a whisper, a few feet to Antony's left.

“I think so? Unless we've delved entirely into the metaphoric. It's so hard to tell with some of these fellows.”

Hirtius made a faint noise. “It's this blasted Greek education. You know, I was taught by a team of slaves on my father's southern estate, and I turned out just fine.”

“If it was good enough for our fathers,” replied Pansa stoutly, “it should be good enough for them.”

Antony had long since given up trying to judge the hour by the quality of light from the door. He thought perhaps he had died and his soul was loitering on the shore of the Acheron, too broke to pay Charon for a lift. Perhaps he would be trapped under the shadow of the Gate of Dis forevermore.

“We killed Caesar,” declared Brutus to the chamber, “not because he was plundering mankind, but because his concentration of power allowed others to do so. So long as the provincial administrations remain structured as they were, this fact remains unchanged.”

Is that why I killed Caesar? thought Antony. He could not, in that moment, recall his reasons.

“But this is why we have proposed increasing the penalty for embezzlement to fifteen years exile,” called Cicero. “Why, Brutus, do you hold us all here and not allow a vote on the matter? Do you not think the number just?”

“The justness of the penalty is not something I question,” said Brutus. “But I am bound to ask whether it is effective. We have recently punished half a dozen men for corruption and yet it continues unabated. Do you see? The men are interchangeable. The graft reigns supreme. Perhaps we should ask why that is, and address _that_ problem. I am not convinced the exile does that.”

“Brutus is welcome to make a study of it,” said Cicero. He paused to allow all in the room to mark the faint chuckles before continuing, “but in the meantime – as the great lawmaker Solon once said, a state is held together with but two things: reward and punishment.”

And tireless Brutus replied, “Why did Solon leave no room for honor or duty?”

Eyebrows raised, Antony unwillingly looked to Cicero, who blinked in delicate disbelief. Their eyes accidentally met across the open floor of the chamber; the accord lasted for but a second before they both shook it off, displeased.

Brutus continued doggedly, “Are we never to trust our fellow citizens to do the right thing, for the right reasons? What is the point of all this, then?”

Antony thought, you are so close. The realization is there, Brutus, waiting for you – just reach out and grab it....

“I'm afraid I do not understand the consul, or his point of confusion,” said Cicero. “The point is that Rome should continue to prosper. Governing is the dirty but necessary business to that end. We set up laws to guide us and enact punishments to guard us.”

“Except the punishments don't seem to be working. As I have been saying for the past hour.”

Had it only been an hour?

Antony could hear the frustration working its way to the surface in Brutus's voice. There was a reason the man had made an excellent pleader but usually refrained from speaking during senatorial debates. The one activity required earnest appeal; the other, flexibility.

And not even Brutus's most devoted admirers would describe him as flexible.

Enough. Antony was done with this for today.

“Numera,” he announced, jumping in just as Brutus opened his mouth to continue.

Brutus stopped. He raised his chin; he breathed.

He turned to Antony. “A quorum call? You're asking for a quorum call _now_?”

“Why not?” he said. “I wouldn't want the Senate to do anything without a clear majority of senators actually present.”

He took a short step towards Antony and said, in a low tone that nevertheless likely drifted over the round, endlessly receiving room, “We've been here since dawn. The debate's been going on for seven hours.”

“Oh, I'm well aware.” Antony stifled a yawn and waved a hand. “That's why I want a quorum call. An unseasonably warm autumn day like this, I'm concerned we may have lost a critical number to their garden courts and couches.”

Brutus narrowed his eyes. “Have you done something? What have you done?”

Antony gazed at him a moment with serenity, but he became aware of the men waiting, and his eyes hardened as they swept around the chamber. “Have you all suffered a loss of hearing? Numera, I said.”

With a chorus of muttering and sighs and the unmistakable shuffling of not a few in the audience to the exits, the Senate set about its roll call. Thin-lipped with displeasure, Brutus slowly resumed his own seat, though his back remained as straight as Lustitia's sword. Antony reclined sideways and watched him with bright-eyed interest.

Brutus observed the quorum call through narrowed eyes. He wouldn't look at him as he said quietly, “This is the fourth time this month you have delayed Senate business.”

“You hold me responsible for the last delay?” asked Antony. “Look, if a man wants to stand and drone on until nightfall, that's his choice. Nothing to do with me.”

“An absurd and transparent tactic, Antony.”

“A tactic perfected by your beloved uncle, Brutus,” he pointed out.

A muscle jumped in his jaw. “Be that as it may, it's one we should revise. Critical business of the state should not be held up on the whims of a single petulant voice. We'll never get anything done.”

His poor colleague spoke so often of _getting business done_. He still harbored the delusion, one Antony abandoned months ago, of a politics that was bounded and finite. Brutus ran himself ragged every day as if sprinting towards a finish line, one that did not exist.

“You could put an end to it easily enough,” said Antony. “All you have to do is... say the word. As you well know, your command would be my pleasure.”

Brutus's eyes checked the rows of senators in stifled dismay. He was very concerned someone might overhear Antony when he spoke like this. And indeed, if Antony wasn't so sure that surprise was critical to the success of the plot, he would take out an advertisement with the newsreader in the forum, just to watch Brutus rend his garments from stress.

“You know I will not,” said Brutus stiffly, “and I'd thank you to stop speaking of it.”

Antony shrugged with a quiescence that seemed only to make the other man grow more tense. They sat in silence for the rest of the quorum call. When the number came up eleven men short, the chamber burst in pockets of impatient shouting and cries of sabotage.

“Seven hours,” said Brutus in flat disbelief. “Seven hours, wasted.”

Antony stood and stretched ostentatiously. He shook out his shoulders. He turned to his co-consul with a pleasant smile and was met with a wild punch.

It skidded off his cheekbone, not a solid hit by any means, but he stumbled half a step back from surprise alone. The calls in the chamber died down, shock plain on many faces.

The silence was barely born before it grew charged.

Antony tasted blood in his mouth from where he had bit his cheek. He looked at Brutus, who stood with his eyes closed and head bowed, his hand still in a half-formed fist against his chest.

He spat. Blood landed upon the floor of the Senate and, as if this was a signal, the shoving and shouting started.  
  


* * *

  
“I,” said Brutus, “should not have done that.”

Antony paced the atrium, having refused to enter any deeper into the house. This hadn't improved either of their moods, for Brutus was house proud and sulky and Antony was heartily sick of looking at the fresco on the eastern wall. The melting faces of the Sabine men almost looked like they were laughing at him.

At Brutus's words, he glanced over and assessed the hand that was currently being soaked in a bowl of cool water. He said dismissively, “Don't worry about me. You hurt yourself far more, by the looks of it.”

He gave Antony a venomous look. “That is _not_ what I meant – Mars knows if there was any justice in this realm, that punch would landed more squarely,” he said. “I meant, I should not have lost my composure in front of the Senate. There are all sorts of rumors floating around already, and this will only feed them.”

Antony had nothing to say to that; it was true. He also found he did not care.

Brutus hunched forward under the weight of self-recrimination. “I've spent weeks being pulled in ten different directions – fighting everyone I know, including you, in an effort to keep us both safe, and now I may have just undone it all in a single afternoon. Gods beneath us. _Fuck!_ ”

Baccha, sitting at Brutus's side, whined and nosed at his master's downturned face.

The quick slap of sandals was heard from the threshold: a man in a civilian tunic burst into the room. His arrival was heralded by a round of enthusiastic barking.

The guards just outside the door glanced inside at Antony, who nodded to indicate they could shut it again to give them privacy. The new man had the arms of a soldier, but an open, pleasant face that seemed unlikely to belong to an assassin.

He rushed froward to address Brutus. His hands came outstretched to forestall Baccha jumping; so he had been in the house before.

“I heard there was a brawl in the Senate this afternoon,” he said anxiously. But he drew up short as he took in the soaking hand. After a moment of supreme confusion, he turned and looked at Antony; his eyes caught on the faint bruise kissing the corner of his cheek. His eyebrows shot up.

“The attempt was poorly made, but perhaps richly deserved,” admitted Antony wryly.

Brutus said, “Lucilius, I'm fine. And he's fine. Everyone is – fine.”

“Marcus Favonius isn't fine,” said Lucilius, “Someone kneed him in the groin. He's been moaning about it down at the baths.”

“No great loss there, if there are any permanent effects,” said Antony. The newcomer shot him a quick grin.

Brutus cast him a half-hearted look but said to Lucilius, “I'm sure he will recover.”

“So you are Lucilius, alleged old friend to this one,” said Antony, walking in a half-circle and inspecting him like he might a soldier in formation. Lucilius tolerated this inspection, but followed his passage like no soldier ever would: with an appraising eye of his own.

“I've heard of you, of course, but I'll be honest,” said Antony, “I long thought Brutus made you up, so as to not seem so deeply antisocial.”

Brutus scowled. But then Lucilius smiled down at him, and the smile was almost a key in a lock: opening a door and allowing Brutus in on the joke. The scowl faded.

Antony was impressed.

“He _is_ deeply antisocial,” said Lucilius. “But I've always seemed to have an idea when to buzz off and leave him alone. Haven't I?” he directed the question to his friend.

The uninjured hand fluttered up to pat his arm. “I never tire of your company, Lucilius, you know that.”

“You are a rarity, then, to be sure,” said Antony, folding his arms. “You were with the First in Illyria until recently, correct? Were you there when old Gabinius was still alive and kicking, or was that before your tour?”

“I was under his command during the retreat to Salona, during the war,” said Lucilius.

He hissed out a sympathetic breath. “Rough march, I heard.”

“Bit grim, yeah. We were without supplies for a couple months – it wasn't Gabinius's fault,” he added quickly, clearly not wanting to cause offense. He seemed to be the type to speak plainly and think better of it only after. “Just, there were some bad storms that year.”

“Be at ease,” he said, dismissing his concern with a wave of the hand. “You'll find no tender feeling from my corner. He was my first commander, and you know how those are – a few fond memories, sure, but much of the time you wish you could resurrect the man just to kill him again.”

“Syria and then Egypt, right? I heard you scaled a fort by yourself and routed Aristobulus with only a handful of men. Wild stuff.”

“Oh, please,” said Brutus. By this point, he had taken his hand out of the bowl of water and was massaging his eyes. Baccha, sensing his master's mood, was attempting to help by bathing his nearest ankle with an intent tongue. “Don't start praising his exploits in the field. Or, at the very least, don't do it in my presence. This man needs no encouragement.”

Lucilius glanced at his friend with light chagrin. “Perhaps you are right, Brutus. After all, it is not like you to physically attack someone.”

“Brutus only pretends to be at his wit's end. It is his favorite pastime,” said Antony.

Lucilius said, loyalty firming his tone, “From what I've heard, he has had a lot of practice recently.”

At his side, Brutus went rigid. He began to lift his head out of his hands as Antony asked, voice still quite pleasant, “Oh? And what have you heard?”

He shrugged. “My friend is in love with a crazy rogue of a general and worries it's going to destroy the country.”

“... _Lucilius_ ,” whispered Brutus in broken horror.

The man looked at him and his expression was transformed by the crushed soul on display. His eyes widened. “That is – no? Not that you.” He turned to Antony. “And not that _you_ are – I didn't mean.” He took a quick breath. “What I meant was—”

Antony threw his head back and laughed.  
  


* * *

  
“Are we going to discuss what your friend said?” asked Antony as Brutus walked him to the door.

“I will not discuss it in the atrium, like it's – _small talk_. Pleasantries. For one, there's nothing pleasant about it.” He paused. “If you truly wish to talk, we can do it in my study.”

Antony knew what would happen if they were to go into Brutus's study. His mouth curled and he shook his head, watching from the corner of his eye as Brutus's shoulders fell.

“My stance remains the same as it was. And you?” He turned at the door and put a hand on the wall beside Brutus's head. He leaned in. “Is yours?”

The man's expression was withering. “You do recall I assaulted you in full view of the Senate not two hours ago?”

He pursed his lips. “Don't see what that has to do with anything.” He let his gaze wander downward, and Brutus took on a harassed look.

“Whatever you think you heard Lucilius say, Antony, know that my feelings are immaterial next to my principles.”

He cast his eyes up and let his body follow, peeling away from Brutus and the wall and turning for the door.

“Antony.”

He sighed and stopped. “ _What_.”

“I – am sorry I hit you. I should not have done it.”

All his lingering good humor winked out. “I've told you,” he grated out, not looking at him. “You can do you whatever you please with me. It's your refusal that is causing me to suffer.”

A hand touched his hip; the one that had thrown the punch. Brutus said softly in his ear, “Come back to my study.”

He couldn't feel the hand without immediately wanting it to tighten, to press and make the presence leave a bruise. But bruises always fade with time; it would just be pretending.

“No,” he said at last, and stepped forward out of the other's grasp.

And people said he had no self-control.  
  


* * *

  
A few days passed before Antony found an appropriate site within a mile of the pomerium. With his consular seal he was able to acquire the land and contract the requisite workmen. His preparations managed to go unnoticed until he had to address his colleagues in the college of augurs, whose cooperation he would need before moving ahead with the consecration.

He invited them down and stood to the side, idly turning his lituus through his fingers as he waited for them to assess the site. There wasn't much to be seen yet; it was a cleared lot between a market and an equus neighborhood. But if Antony's plan worked out, it would eventually become a hallowed site of great historic significance.

Cicero had barely surveyed the construction markers before he turned to Antony and asked, “And what is this site to be used for again?”

Antony did not react to the suspicion in his voice. He said promptly, “Contemplation and filial worship; I want those soldiers who are orphans to have somewhere close by where they can pay their respects to Mother Rome. Reestablishing a spiritual ancestral connection is important for discipline – and discipline surely cuts down on some of the more rowdy behavior we see in the streets now and then.”

“Your lot throwing their weight around, you mean,” said Cicero.

Antony smiled and spread his hands. “All they need is faith, a renewal of faith. They are good men, most of them.”

Standing watch nearby, Vorenus shifted on his feet. He knew only the pretense of Antony's plans, not the truth, and he was discomfited, in the way all fallen religious men were discomfited at open and unqualified expressions of faith.

“It is heartening to see you turn your efforts towards bolstering the public spirit, Antonius,” said Verginius, who had always been one of the more gullible of his colleagues.

Cicero's eyes remained narrowed, but even he could find no reason not to consent. The college agreed to take auspices for the site and, should the results be favorable, schedule a consecration.

“Grand.” Antony stopped spinning his lituus and clapped. “Let us throw some crow.”  
  


* * *

  
Two days after the augurs' visit, Brutus himself came down to the site.

Antony was supervising the work from his seat on a pillar yet to be erected. He had his toga pitched around him for a bit of shade and was eating crackers. When his co-consul arrived with Baccha at his side, he whistled to gain the pair's attention.

Baccha's tail wagged and he barked a greeting. Antony tossed him a cracker and shook his head sadly as the dog tried and failed to snap it out of the air.

“Hopeless,” he said, but quietly, so the dog did not hear.

“I know what you're doing, Antony,” called Brutus. He'd raised an arm to block the sun from his eyes and was attempting to glare while squinting. Hardly impressive.

“What's that, then.”

“It won't work,” he replied, instead of answering directly. “You will never get them to agree to meet here, under this... pavilion, or whatever it is you are building.”

Antony sighed and sat up. He balanced on his wrists a moment before jumping down from the pillar. Brutus stepped back, his hand falling to his side.

“You really think I can't get a measly two hundred senators to show up wherever I tell them to?” he asked.

Brutus said, “Perhaps you could intimidate enough for a quorum. But why would you? Those who don't attend will only feel crossed. And, given the recent state of our public image, they might feel emboldened to—”

Antony threw out a hand and declared cheerfully, “It is time the Senate be more open to the people. No more cloistering ourselves away; we should be more like the Assemblies. The spirit of democracy demands it.”

“We're a republic,” said Brutus peevishly. “Not a democracy. And the Senate has no wish to conduct its business within earshot of cattle merchants and butcher shops.” He lowered his voice. “Enough. We both know you don't care about the spirit of democracy. Why this production? What do you want – besides, you know. That thing we are not discussing.”

Antony sobered. thought about telling him of his dreams, of warnings of impending doom. But Quintus was long gone and he had no workable leads or evidence of a plot. In the end, he would rather look like a power-mad warmonger than a paranoiac hiding behind his army.

“It is as Cicero once said,” he ended up going with. “Simple matter of security.”

And perhaps he needed say no more, for Brutus did not ask for specifics. He only nodded to himself and attended the problem. “If you wish to move the Senate closer, there are existing venues we could use. The Theatre of Pompey—”

At Antony's incredulous look, Brutus cut his own words off. He put his head back and waited.

“If I wished to invite an assassination with maximum symbolic potential then – yes, Brutus, we could meet in the Theatre of Pompey,” he said. He had not stepped foot inside the Theatre's senate chamber since he slew Caesar. He thought he knew this.

“Oh, are you trying to discourage assassination attempts?” inquired Brutus. “I honestly could not tell.”

They smiled sarcastically at one another.

“Antony!” A woman's voice rang out over the street.

He whirled around, gaze searching, and after a long moment he finally located the owner of the voice looking out at him from the window of a litter. It was she.

His smile transformed, unstoppable. He took two steps, dropped to a knee, and spread his arms wide.

“Fulvia, my truest love,” he shouted for everyone to hear, “you have returned to me!”

“Oh, for fuck's sake,” said Brutus behind him. “Get up, man, you're a consul. I mean – really.”

She burst forth onto the pavers in an explosion of violet silks and flyaway curls and ran to him. They met in midair like Cupid reuniting with Psyche, and he held her tightly aloft and spun, relishing her shriek of delight in his ear.

When they were still again, Fulvia said, “Antony, you must know the passion and yearning that has tormented me during these long months of separation.” Her hand crept around his waist and helped itself to a handful. Behind them, Brutus made a faint scandalized noise.

Antony stroked her cheek and said ardently, “Well do I know this pain. Every night since you left me, please believe I have dreamed of you, and only of you, and upon awakening weep without fail to find you gone.”

“Am I to get a similar greeting?” inquired Lucius, ambling up in Fulvia's wake, “Or is such treatment reserved for my wife?”

Antony looked up from where he had his sister-in-law dipped over one knee. He scrutinized his brother narrowly. “Well, you're a bit heavier than she is – but, look, let's give a try, that's only fair—”

Lucius evaded his grasping hand, laughing. Antony finally restored Fulvia to standing, squeezed her waist once and let her go.

“Pietas,” he said, turning to him.

“Imperator,” said Lucius, straight-faced.

They embraced and Antony kissed his cheeks: loud smacking kisses one gives one's kid brother, even if he is thirty-five and taller than him and both their partners are watching.

Stepping back and looking at him, Antony felt an unfamiliar sensation: the lifting of a weight he was so accustomed to carrying, he had barely realized it was there. He had plenty of men whose loyalty he could rely on because of duty or obligation, but with his brother there was no reason, no question. Loyalty was not even a choice with them; they were both cut from the same tightly-woven cloth.

Fulvia captured Lucius's arm and tilted her head against his shoulder as she looked at Antony. “So, are you over this silly idea of keeping Lucius out of trouble, then?”

“Lucius?” said Antony. “Woman, I think we both know who I was actually worried about. Figured if you stayed in Rome, we'd be a monarchy in a month, and my colleagues simply do not move that fast.”

Fulvia acknowledged the truth of this with her customary modesty.

“We have much to discuss,” said Lucius. “I should report, the legions—”

“That can wait, surely,” she said sharply. “Not on our first night back, we talked about this.”

Hesitating, glancing between them, Antony asked him, “Will one night change this news?”

Lucius looked at his wife and shook his head, though he looked faintly troubled.

“Alright boys,” said Fulvia, laying a hand on Antony's arm so she had possession of both brothers Antonius. She subtly directed them to turn down the street. “Now, I have some very involved plans for this evening. First, my friend Cassia is holding a concert—”

“I'm afraid that won't be possible,” said Brutus pointedly behind them. “We have a previous engagement. Consular business.”

The trio paused and turned. Antony grimaced; the look was even half-sincere. He was so unused to having allies at his side, he forgot himself. “Apologies. I've been remiss – Brutus, this is my brother Lucius and his charming wife—”

“We've met,” said Fulvia.

She locked eyes with his co-consul and disdain flowed from both directions as if powered by twenty oars. Antony and Lucius exchanged looks over her head; Antony's look said _what the fuck is she talking about, Pietas_ , and Lucius's look replied _before my time, Brother, don't ask me_.

“Yes, I believe I recall,” said Brutus, in the tone of one remembering the passing of a kidney stone. “Your late husband was reporting to Caesar in Ravenna during one of my visits. The two of you made quite a display of yourselves.”

Antony could only imagine; Fulvia and Curio had been a devastatingly suitable match. Two beautiful creatures of privilege who loved nothing more than to show off. They would have been – he thought, a little bittersweet – utterly repellent to Brutus.

Antony had always been drawn to uncompromising people.

“And as _I_ recall, you sat like a lump at Caesar's right hand the entire night, perfectly complacent of your own worth,” she replied.

Her voice was polite, but her fingers were digging slightly into Antony's bicep. He was fairly confident that Fulvia wouldn't attack a consul of Rome in a public street, but he thought it best to intervene just in case.

He said, “Now that we have established what great old friends we all are, why don't we go to our next appointment together. The – dinner with Lepidus and your sister was it? Right?” he added to Brutus.

He was given a look that plainly said he received no credit for having remembered correctly.

“Lepidus?” said Fulvia. “We are old acquaintances. That will be acceptable.”

Brutus adjusted his toga fastidiously. “Well, as long as it's _acceptable_ to you.”

“Perhaps I should remain behind with the legions,” said Lucius in an undertone to Antony.

The answer was a resounding _no_ on three fronts.  
  


* * *

  
Lepidus proved himself useful about twice a year, and that night was one such occasion. He sat on the central couch and thoroughly dominated the conversation over dinner with fretting about the upcoming Vestal capture. This created an effective wall between Brutus and Fulvia, forestalling the worst of the sniping.

“It's a lot of responsibility,” said Lepidus. He was already florid with wine. “A lot of responsibility.”

“Anyone offer you a bribe yet, to pass on their darling little girl?” asked Antony.

Brutus, who had been exchanging quiet words with Junia Secunda, cut him a look.

“I very nearly was chosen for the Vestals,” said Fulvia, reminiscing. “My mother wanted to break my nose – you know, make me look as unappealing as possible. But in the end Father just slipped old Scaevola a fat purse.”

“I wouldn't want to end up like him,” said Lepidus, clearly having not heard a word but the name. And, to be fair, it was what every man thought when he heard of the former Pontifex Maximus, who had been cut to pieces in a lobby and then dumped in the Tiber.

“I wouldn't worry, Lepidus. You chose the right side, after all,” said Fulvia. She smiled and popped a grape in her mouth.

“Surely those days of civil strife and bloodshed are all over,” said Junia. She possessed all of Servilia's pride but little of her fortitude, and was consequently a habitually nervous woman. “I should prefer to think they are.”

“They are,” said Brutus firmly.

Fulvia looked at them, and whatever was in her gaze caused Junia's chin to go up and her cheeks to turn a dull red. Lepidus did not notice, but Brutus narrowed his eyes.

Antony casually leaned forward and, under the pretense of picking up a plate, reached over and pinched Fulvia's waist. “Be nice,” he muttered out of the side of his mouth.

“Dearest Antony,” she replied, “Do not ask me to turn from my strengths.”

He looked past her to Lucius on the next couch. His brother had set upon the wine with nearly as much determination as Lepidus contemplating his duty, and was now staring down with a fixed, distant look, like he could see through the floor to any and all skeletons that lay beneath the foundation.

“What is wrong with Pietas?” he asked quietly. “He hasn't said three words since we got here, and I fear he'll be sick over our chief priest when it comes time to stand.”

Her playful smile faded. She said, “Tomorrow, Antony. Please.”

And he wondered at this strange insistence, until her dark eyes flicked back to Brutus. He read wariness on her face: wariness and the kind of vigilance he remembered her last holding in the early days of trouble with Pompey, before civil war became a certainty.

The Senate were not the only ones who read discord between the consuls.  
  


* * *

  
“Please try to refrain from spending the rest of the night at an orgy,” said Brutus when they parted on the street outside Lepidus's house. “The Senate reconvenes tomorrow to pick up the matter of embezzlement penalties.”

“And I shall be present and conscious, even if I have to bribe a senator to catch my vomit.” He raised his hands at the man's glare. “That was a joke.” He'd only done it the one time.

“No,” said Brutus, sighing. “It wasn't.”

Brutus nodded with stiff courtesy to Lucius and Fulvia and departed. Antony watched him go and thought of their room in his house and the hours they might spend drinking together around a brazier against the cooling night air. He turned away before the image became maudlin.

“That man just might be the biggest buzzkill on the peninsula,” said Fulvia. She was arm-in-arm with Lucius, which looked normal enough if one did not take in the slight weave in his brother's stance.

“Can he walk?” asked Antony, peering through the gloaming to judge the glaze in his eyes.

“ _He_ ,” said Lucius, with great deliberation, “once rode over the Alps blind drunk.”

“I give more credit to the horse with that one.”

“I'm fine.”

“Good.” Antony clapped him on the shoulder and let his grip tighten along the back of his neck. “Then we are away, to home.”

“Home?” Lucius's brow seesawed in a bizarre panic. “Brother, we cannot.”

“Why not?”

Lucius glanced at Fulvia and then lowered his voice, as if hoping his wife might not hear when he whispered, “I – I don't want Mamma to see me drunk.”

He stared, thrown by the mention of Julia. “What?”

“To camp, Lucius,” said Fulvia. “He meant we are going back to his camp.” His face cleared with relief and she patted his arm, comforting. “I suppose in his current state, we really have no other option. But I had hoped to catch a party at Publius Vedius's.”

“No,” agreed Antony. “We have no other option. We are going back and you two are going to tell me what, exactly, is going on with my legions.”

Her lips tightened, but she did not argue.

The trip felt doubly longer at night than it did during the day, and Lucius had started to sober by the time they arrived and settled in Antony's tent. Fulvia offered him a cup of wine, which he refused with a wordless shake of the head; this was when Antony's concern began to turn more serious.

He leaned his hip against his campaign table and folded his arms. “Well? Please don't keep me in suspense. Share your troubles, and Fulvia here can act the chorus and wail where appropriate.”

Lucius sighed. His jaw firmed and he raised his head to meet Antony's eyes. He said, “The Macedonian legions are subverted. They can't be trusted.”

Antony said nothing. He did not move.

“I suspect – three or four,” continued Lucius. “But I only know of two for sure: the Fourth and the Martia—”

“Suspect,” he interrupted. “What does that mean, who could—”

“Agrippa. It was Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa. Do you remember the boy? Caesar talked of him during the war. He was at the battle at Munda.” Lucius sat forward, almost pleading now. “He was with the legions before I ever got to Macedonia, Marcus. He was with them in Apollonia the whole time Caesar was planning his Danube campaign.”

“And? Who the fuck is this Agrippa that he should trifle with a consul of Rome?” demanded Antony, standing.

Lucius scraped a hand over his head. He shook his head. “No one, so far as I can tell. Etrurian plebeian family. But – ” He hesitated.

It was Fulvia spoke and finished the thought:

“He is close friends with Gaius Octavius, the one they now call Caesar.”  
  


* * *

  
Antony did not sleep and was in the Curia before even Brutus the next morning. His co-consul gave him a long, searching look, but Antony only shook his head absently. They did not speak as the chamber slowly filled.

From the first bench, Cicero stood. “Before we return to the issue of the embezzlement penalties, I should like to speak on another topic, as I have some things concerning the Republic which I think myself bound to say at the present time.”

The Fourth, Antony thought. The Fourth and the Martia. Eleven thousand men he had taken as his when making his calculations. Now – gone. Like they'd never been anything more than etchings in wax.

“The Senate will hear Marcus Tullius Cicero,” said the magistrate.

And who is to say the other Macedonian legions weren't suspect as well? How could he be sure of any legion's loyalty? At the critical juncture, which direction would any Macedonian blade point?

Cicero cleared his throat.

Antony blinked and focused. To his right, Brutus was watching the senator with a faintly quizzical look; whatever this was, he hadn't known about it beforehand.

Once he saw he commanded the attention of his fellow senators and both consuls, Cicero smiled. He lifted a hand.

And Cicero began to speak.

**Author's Note:**

> It's autumn in 44 BC and almost autumn in 2020 CE, which means all political discontents are about to go the fuck off: it's Philippics time, baby. 
> 
> (I'm sure things will work out about as well for us as they did for Cicero.)
> 
> Cicero's first line at the end there is taken from the beginning of Philippics I, translated by C. D. Yonge, available on the previously mentioned Perseus site. 
> 
> Brutus's line during the debate (“killed him not because he was plundering mankind, but because his concentration of power allowed others to do so”) is from Plutarch, translated by Ian Scott-Kilvert.


End file.
